The Holy of Holies (1)

 

 

This post is number 156 in our reflections on the Upper Room (John chapters 13 – 17). The first reflection was posted on June 24, 2023, now we are in 2026. By God’s grace, these posts contain around 140,000 words, all, I hope, focused on Jesus Christ; all, I hope, seeking to reveal His amazing love and grace for you, for us.

 

I still recall sitting at our computer in 2023 and wanting to write about John 17, a passage at the core of my heart, mind, and soul; a passage which has been capturing my life for decades, a passage which has been drawing me into the koinonia of the Trinity; a passage which has made me know that such koinonia is about “us,” not just about me; it can never be just about me.

 

I also recall the realization that I could not write about John 17, the Holy of Holies, without taking us on the journey to the Holy of Holies, from the Outer Court with its laver for washing, into the Holy Place, and then into the Holy of Holies.

 

I began with that first post, An Inclusio of Identity, which contains this paragraph:

 

If we fully enter into the Upper Room we will find ourselves before the foundation of the world, in the Incarnation, and in the transcendence of koinonia with the Triune God. We will see the unfolding of John12:24, “Unless a grain of wheat falls into the ground and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit.”

 

Jesus took His disciples through John chapters 13 – 16 before He could lead them into Chapter 17, I could do no less.

 

Knowing that “unless the LORD builds the house, they labor in vain who build it,” I’ve sought to submit myself to the Holy Spirit and the Word as we’ve been on pilgrimage. I’ve also endeavored to “take the adventure that Aslan gives us,” keeping in mind that “those who are being led by the Spirit of God are the sons and daughters of God.”

 

As Jesus draws us into the Holy of Holies, let us keep in mind that the veil is no more.

 

“And behold, the veil of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom” (Matthew 27:51; see also Hebrews 9:1 – 14; 10:19 – 23). You and I now have a “new and living Way” in koinonia with our God, it is time for us to come Home, the Door is open.

 

“I do not ask on behalf of these alone, but for those also who believe in Me through their word; that they may all be one; even as You, Father, are in Me and I in You, that they also may be in Us, so that the world may believe that You sent Me” (John 17:20 – 21).

 

As we saw in our previous reflection, Jesus prays for you, He prays for me, He prays for us…Jesus is always praying for us (Hebrews 7:25).

 

What does Jesus pray for us?

 

That we may all be one even as He and the Father are one.

 

“That they may all be one” (17:21).

 

“That they may be one, just as We are one” (17:22).

 

“That they may be perfected into one” (17:23).

 

Let us read these words of Jesus to the Father over and over again, allowing them to sink deep into our souls, our hearts, our minds. Let us allow the Holy Spirit to create a vision of these words in our innermost beings. Let us allow the roots of these words to penetrate the essence of our who we are, forming us into the image of this Word, drawing us together in Christ into the Trinity.

 

Behold the beauty of “I in them and You in Me, that they may be perfected into one.” This is a transforming beauty, a beauty that, once seen, can never be forgotten (let us hope). This is a beauty worth selling everything to purchase, a beauty worth a man's or a woman’s life.

 

This is a beauty that dwarfs our little religious fiefdoms, our parochial territories and attitudes, our doctrinal distinctives, our insistence on ownership of our religious franchises. This beauty is about more than “Jesus and me,” it is about more than “Jesus and our group,” it is about Jesus and us His Body, and then it is about us in the Us of John 17:21; that our “us” may be in the “Us” of the Trinity – “that they may be in Us.”

 

We are to love one another just as Jesus loves us (John 13:34 – 35; 15:12 – 13). The Nature of our love for one another is to be the Nature of Jesus’ love for us, divinely cruciform. We are to live in unity, in oneness, just as the Trinity is One, the Nature of our unity is the Nature of the Trinity. We must desire no less, we must preach no less, we must live (by His grace) in no less than the Nature of God.

 

Let us note that there are two testimonies, two elements of witness, that are the result of our Oneness in the Trinity. The first is that the world may know that the Father sent the Son (John 17:21, 23), the second is that the world may know that the Father loves us as He loves Jesus (17:23)..

 

In other words, as the Father loves the Only Begotten Son, so the Father loves the corporate Son; as the Father loves the Head, so the Father loves the Body; but of course they are One.

 

How foolish we are to think that we can circumvent the prayer of Christ Jesus, that we can relegate it to the impractical, that we can find a method for witness that bypasses the heart of the Father, that we can impose our standards of acceptance on others, that we have warrant to build our own houses while the House of God lies desolate (Haggai 1:9).

 

We are also foolish to think that we can organize and create the Oneness for which Jesus prays. Let us be clear about this, only the work of the Holy Spirit and submission to the Word of God can fulfill the prayer of Jesus. “Except the LORD build the House, they labor in vain who build it” (Psalm 127).

 

As we as individuals experience the koinonia of the Trinity, it ignites a flame on the altar of our hearts that all our brothers and sisters may know this glorious fellowship, this sweet communion, our prayers rising to the heavenly altar as sweet incense to the Triune God. Our lives are transformed into a holocaust, an offering, on behalf of the Lamb for His People. As John writes, “We know love by this, that He laid down His life for us; and we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren” (1 John 3:16).

 

Perhaps my 5^th great grandfather, Patrick Henry, expressed (on a lower level) what our attitude should be when he participated in the First Continental Congress. Henry said, “I am not a Virginian, but an American.”

 

We must be more than Baptists, more than Roman Catholics, more than Presbyterians, more than Lutherans; more than Reformed or Arminian or Pentecostal or Anglican; we must be first and foremost, first and last, Christians…followers of Jesus Christ…seeking to obtain and preserve “the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace” (Eph. 4:3).

 

Must this not begin in my own heart and life?

 

Must this not begin from congregation to congregation in our respective locations?  

 

Must this not begin in pastor-to-pastor local relationships?

 

To think that Jesus is making the Name of the Father known to us, so that the “love with which You loved Me may be in them, and I in them” (John 17:26).

 

Isn’t this worth living for?

 

Jesus Asking for Us

 

“I do not ask on behalf of these alone, but for those also who believe in Me through their word” (John 17:20).

 

I take much comfort in these words of Jesus, to think that He prayed for me, He prayed for you, He prayed for us. In fact, not only did He pray for us, He continues to pray for us:

 

“Therefore He is able also to save completely those who draw near to God through Him, since He always lives to make intercession for them” (Hebrews 7:25). This is amazing to me, that Jesus prays for me.

 

Everyone of us who know Jesus Christ today can trace our knowing Him back to that first generation of men and women who first knew Him while He walked the earth. We don’t know how many there were in that first generation. We tend to focus on the original Apostles, apostles with a capital “A”. We might also think of the 70 who Jesus sent out during His ministry (Luke 10:1). Then there were about 120 in the Upper Room (Acts 1:15) – were they all there on the Day of Pentecost? Were there more, were there less? Were there hundreds in that first generation just before Pentecost? Were there thousands? (They need not all have been in Jerusalem, though for sure Jerusalem was the epicenter).

 

We don’t know the specifics, but what we do know is that, compared to what was to come, relatively speaking, it was a small group from which we are descended…but is that not often the case? Most importantly, we are descended from Jesus Christ, for every man and woman of that first generation received their New Life from Jesus (we are no longer in “Adam” but in “Christ”; Romans 5:12 – 21; 1 Corinthians 15:35 – 49).

 

The point is that we are all children of the first generation in one way or another. Even those who have had the miracle of direct revelation can trace that revelation into the communion of saints, to the faithful testimony of that first generation…a generation of which Christ Jesus is the Firstborn; from Him we all descend (and ascend!)

 

My great-great Aunt Martha, who was born in the 19^th century, told me of her Aunt Rose. Her lasting memory of Rose was contained in the words, “Aunt Rose prayed.” When I first heard this from Aunt Martha in the 1960s my thought was, “Aunt Rose prayed for me.” You see, I am certain that Rose’s prayers included her family, her family as she then knew it, and her family as it would unfold in the future. Therefore, her prayers included me.

 

There is a historical record of one of my 5^th great grandfathers walking his property in the 18^th century and praying for his family. Since I’ve been on that very property it is easy for me to visualize him walking and praying, praying and walking. I am certain that he prayed for me, that I was included in his intercessory prayers for his family, his family which then was and his family which was to come.

 

A friend recently told me that he realized that the seed he was sowing in the lives of his family, of his children and grandchildren, might not bear fruit until after he had passed from this life. My friend saw beyond his own life…and yet what he saw was his own life in Christ, a life that doesn’t end with death, but continues both in heaven and still on earth. What I mean is that my friend’s prayers and words will live on in his children and grandchildren and great grandchildren and beyond.

 

This approaches what we mean when we speak of the “communion of the saints.” We can participate in a transcendent community (Hebrews 12:1; 12:22 – 24). As we meditate on John 17:20, we can sense the transcendence to which we belong, the numinosity of the Divine Family of God.

 

For some of us this is as natural as breathing, for most of us it may take a while for our bodies to become acclimated to the high elevations.

 

The vital thing is to know that not only did Jesus pray for us, for you and for me, but that He continues to pray for us. Jesus has never stopped praying for us. Jesus prayed for you 2,000 years ago and He continues praying for you.

 

When we are discouraged, when we have doubts, when we face challenges, let’s remind ourselves and others that Jesus is praying for us. If we are encouraged when others pray for us, how much more should we be encouraged to know that Jesus is praying for us. (And of course if Jesus is praying for us, then we most certainly ought to be praying for one another.)

 

As we will see, the Lord willing, in our next reflection, Jesus is asking the Father that we all might live in the Holy of Holies, in unspeakable communion with one another in the Trinity. What Jesus is asking – for you and for me – is beyond comprehension, but not beyond what our experience can be.